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Through It Came Bright Colors

by Trebor Healey (Goodreads Author)

3.74 of 5 stars 3.74 · rating details · 34 ratings · 6 reviews

Through It Came Bright Colors is the story of Neill Cullane, a closeted, conflicted 21-year-old who lives in two worlds, light-years and a short drive of his beat-up VW bug apart. At home, he's the dutiful son of Frank and Grace, and devoted brother to Peter, whose battle with a cruel, disfiguring cancer pulls the Cullane family together, however reluctantly. But in the sh...more

Paperback, 232 pages

Published September 5th 2003 by Southern Tier Editions

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Oct 26, 2012 Mark Lancaster rated it 5 of 5 stars

Wow. Trebor Healey is rapidly becoming one of my favourite gay writers. I don't like to go into massive reviews because a) I'm not a critic, and b) I don't want to include any spoilers. Healey's prose is beautiful, however, as he describes Neill's deeply loving relationship with his brother Peter, as Neill cares for Peter during the latter's ongoing cancer treatment, and Neill's burgeoning sexuality and relationship with Vince, the troubled cancer patient he meets in the waiting room at the canc...more

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Sep 10, 2011 Blake Fraina rated it 3 of 5 stars

This is not a love story. Nor do I think it was intended to be. It is, first and foremost, about the emotional growth of its narrator, Neill Cullane, a suburban youth confused about his sexuality and his role in his family. Although it might certainly, and rightfully, be viewed by the GLBT community as a "coming out" story, I think it is the latter theme, the exploration of family relationships, that ultimately distinguishes the book and makes it not only moving, but universal. Vince Malone, the...more This is not a love story. Nor do I think it was intended to be. It is, first and foremost, about the emotional growth of its narrator, Neill Cullane, a suburban youth confused about his sexuality and his role in his family. Although it might certainly, and rightfully, be viewed by the GLBT community as a "coming out" story, I think it is the latter theme, the exploration of family relationships, that ultimately distinguishes the book and makes it not only moving, but universal. Vince Malone, the charismatic, troubled street hood with whom Neill has his first sexual relationship, serves only as a vehicle through which Neill and the reader come to understand the intimate link between acceptance and love. Just as Rain Man is the story of Charlie Babbit, not his emotionally stunted brother Raymond, we know from the book's prophetic opening line that Through it Came Bright Colors is not a story of redemption for Vince. As with Rain Man, the focus is on the character who has the ability to change and grow, Neill, and what his relationship with Vince teaches him about himself.

While Neill is exploring his burgeoning sexuality, his family appears, on the surface, to be coming unravelled. His "golden boy" younger brother Peter is undergoing a series of increasingly more disfiguring cancer surgeries and his parents are having difficulty coping. It is in the juxtaposition of the scenes of Neill's family (in present day and flashback) as they tentatively, awkwardly, knit together, with flashbacks to the nightmarish erosion of Vince's homelife that the book exhibits its major strength. Ultimately, Neill realises that the true pleasure of love is in the giving of it, not the receiving of it. When someone accepts your love, they also accept you. Individual scenes between Neill and each member of his family (including his macho older brother Paul, who, like Vince, pushes him away) tenderly, sometimes painfully, illustrate this.

At times the book has a bit of a cobbled together feel with some clumsy transitions between episodes in the Tenderloin with Vince, scenes of Neill's family life and the numerous flashbacks/reminiscences (with one particularly jarring shift of POV in a fairly short flashback sequence between Vince and a female psychologist that should have been either re-worked or expunged entirely). These things might easily have been remedied with the expansion of some sections (to smooth transitions) or perhaps by using a third person limited (as opposed to first person) narrative, but on the whole the book reads smoothly and coheres quite well. And these shortcomings are far outweighed by the carefully chosen language, rich with metaphor, and the overall emotional impact of story. All in all, I highly recommend this book.

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Feb 24, 2008 Evaine rated it 4 of 5 stars

Recommended to Evaine by: An Amazon Recs List

Shelves: fiction, m-m

This book was not a light, entertaining, escapist read. That being said, it was a beautiful, lyrical (even in, and possibly especially in its darkest moments), at times eviscerating, at times glorious work.

"Love hurts, love heals - that's the crystalline message at the core of Trebor Healey's complex, accomplishing coming-of-age story about a cautiously queer suburban kid whose heart is unexpectedly squeezed hard by a young junkie's quicksilver mind and beautiful lean body. Healey's refreshingl...more This book was not a light, entertaining, escapist read. That being said, it was a beautiful, lyrical (even in, and possibly especially in its darkest moments), at times eviscerating, at times glorious work.

"Love hurts, love heals - that's the crystalline message at the core of Trebor Healey's complex, accomplishing coming-of-age story about a cautiously queer suburban kid whose heart is unexpectedly squeezed hard by a young junkie's quicksilver mind and beautiful lean body. Healey's refreshingly original tale hums with the potency of poetry." That's what Richard Labonte, reviewer at Book Marks and Q Syndicate, had to say about this book and he said it better than I ever could have.

It was dark, it was gritty, it was cruel and it was filled with love and humour and moments of deep affection. It was difficult to read, especially having lost both my parents to cancer (the hero's brother's disease is a main part of the story), but it was familiar and real and touched me in spots I'd thought long-since healed.

I read this passage, where Neill, the protagonist muses about the taking care of his invalid brother, while I was in the cafeteria at work... "In the end, I think his wounds made it easier to love him as they taught me something I didn't know about love. My mother knew it; mothers do. Love was a much more physical thing thank I'd ever understood it to be. It lived where his fingers touched mine; it's what made the water bead up on his shoulders and roll off; it's what made his skin warm, glowing and soft. I'd always thought love was some feeling in the mind, but this was the physicality of love: the love of the body, so much simpler; so much more useful. It felt real, substantial, like proof--like what I needed. Cancer gave me that."... and I had to pause, wipe actual tears from my eyes and then read it over and over, marvelling at the obvious simplicity of something we tend so often to complicate.

So yes, this was a hard book to read, but so beautifully written and thought-provoking; and in the end ultimately very rewarding. The story of Neill; his lover, Vince and Neill's brother, Peter, is so much more than a love story, yet that's exactly what it is.
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Aug 21, 2009 Jacob Staub rated it 5 of 5 stars

A powerful gay coming of age novel. Very honest, avoiding the usual cliches.

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Mar 24, 2008 Larry-bob Roberts rated it 5 of 5 stars

Trebor Healey's background as a poet shines through in his language in this book. The protagonist's bifurcated life between dealing with a health crisis in his family and the drama of a down-and-out boyfriend is reflected in the geographic split between the family's east bay suburbs and San Francisco's skid row.

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Sep 01, 2007 Alvin rated it 5 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Poetic, but never flowery, this novel looks at young men trying to connect through the various deformations of character brought about by a twisted world. A sweet 'n' sour treat that left me glad, sad, and hungry for more.

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May 13, 2013 Don Brookes added it · review of another edition

May 10, 2013 Shanna marked it as wishlist

Shelves: contemporary-fiction, m-m

Mar 31, 2013 Cheri added it · review of another edition

Mar 25, 2013 Steven C added it

Mar 20, 2013 Martin rated it 4 of 5 stars

Mar 18, 2013 Jonathan Wichmann marked it as to-read

Mar 13, 2013 Kim marked it as not-to-read

Feb 22, 2013 James Evans rated it 3 of 5 stars

Feb 20, 2013 Gay City LGBT Library added it · review of another edition

Feb 13, 2013 Chris marked it as to-read

Dec 25, 2012 Rachel marked it as to-read

Dec 24, 2012 Brian rated it 3 of 5 stars

Dec 08, 2012 Kristy marked it as to-read

Dec 08, 2012 Posy Roberts marked it as to-read

Dec 03, 2012 Dana marked it as to-read

Nov 28, 2012 Gillian rated it 2 of 5 stars

Nov 03, 2012 Rich Wiscott marked it as to-read

Shelves: home-library-owned

Oct 24, 2012 Mark marked it as to-read

Oct 08, 2012 Parker rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: homeshelf

Oct 06, 2012 Claire added it

Shelves: outboulder-book-drive

Sep 08, 2012 Charles rated it 3 of 5 stars

Aug 23, 2012 Jennifer marked it as to-read

Aug 09, 2012 Paul rated it 5 of 5 stars

Feb 03, 2013 Warren rated it 4 of 5 stars

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About Trebor Healey

Recently awarded the 2013 Publishing Triangle Ferro-Grumley Fiction Award for A Horse Named Sorrow, Trebor Healey is also the recipient of the Lambda Literary Foundation's 2013 Duggins Outstanding Mid-Career Novelists' Prize and a Violet Quill Award for his first novel Through It Came Bright Colors. His other work includes a collection of poetry, Sweet Son of Pan, and a short story collection, A P...more

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